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Tuesday, 24 February 2015

Meet the team - Claudia Neubacher

Hello, welcome to the latest in our series that throws the spotlight on some of the regular contributors to Craft Stamper. You may recognise the mixed media style of today's featured designer...Claudia Neubacher

Hi and servus (as we love to say in Vienna)! Claudia Neubacher here and I
feel honoured to have been asked to introduce myself a little more on
the Craft Stamper blog!

I live in Austria's beautiful capital Vienna, next to the river Danube, with my lovely husband, son and dog.

Having studied arts I taught arts and woodwork at school for about 20 years before I decided to become a stay at home mom (which I haven't been regretting ever since - although I loved teaching as well). That also provided me with plenty of time to explore my own creativity - which I still enjoy a lot as I had been an enabler for so many years but never had the time to exercise my own artistic skills during that time. So here I am - still learning, exploring and discovering new techniques.

When I discovered rubber stamping back in 2011 a whole new world
revealed itself to me! Stamps - being a really fast and reproducable
means for incorporating images - have freed a lot of creative potential
in me that otherwise would still be sleeping the Sleeping Beauty's
sleep. I started using image stamps first (on tags and ATCs) but soon
turned towards using stamped images rather as a means for adding texture
and depth to my creations. I found that the world of mixed media offers
endless possibilities for getting the most out of one's rubber stamps -
and like most stampers and mixed media artists I have a rather huge
collection of rubber stamps...and find myself turning to the same old
favourite stamps most of the time.

I love this particular project because it was my very first on which I
used stamps to create texture and combine them with my own drawings. In
the background you can see grass stamps that are meant to create an
enchanted forest and the birch trees bark was stamped using a script
stamp. I treasure this creation because it shows me freeing myself from
traditional fine arts techniques. You could call this make a milestone
along my road to artistic freedom.

Q: Do you have a signature style or favourite technique?

A: My
favourite technique at the moment is scraping on paint or Gesso wherever
possible. Either with a palette knife or an old credit card or whatever
I have at hand - as long as I get that speckled result I am aiming for.
I am not sure if I have a signature style...being really versatile
makes it rather hard to develop a single style that can be recognised
immediately I am afraid. Sometimes I envy artists who are able to dive
deep into a single style, technique or theme and explore the endless
possibilities of varying it as this leads to a certain mastery in what
they do. Honestly it took me ages to embrace my versatility as being a
gift instead of a challenge.

This is one of my favourites as it shows my love for combining found objects (the metal bird, which was a flea market find) and old photographs with recycled materials (the shoe box lid and the light bulb) to create something grunge and weathered looking that tells a story. This piece also shows my love for using metal embellishments and sprinkling on drops of colour for more texture. And my love for dark and grungy looking makes of course. Again I used rubber stamps for adding texture - in this case the stamped stitching here and there.

Q: Where do you look for inspiration before you start on a project?

A:
Most of the time it works the other way round: I remember something I
saw and that made a lasting impression on me and then I have to try
reproduce that effect. Often it is something textural or
weathered I saw out in nature or a colour scheme that tickled me. And
obviously I have something like a visual memory that has its own
subconcsious will and pace on setting free some of the treasures it
keeps. And when that happens I am hopefully close to my studio!

If
it has to be done the other way round (for requested projects or
tutorials), I love to browse my library and pinterest boards for
inspiration or also tutorials from other creative folk - as I still love
learning about new techniques and others' views on certain styles and
media!

A make that has some personal value to me as it shows my beloved dog Bluna dreaming her favourite dream (which includes chasing the crows we meet on our walks, running up and down hills as fast as she can and yummy bones of course). It shows my love for selfmade shadow boxes and also a rarely shown side of me as well: the more colourful and whimsical. And you can see two favourite uses of rubber stamping too with the stamped banner (done with my all time favourite letter stamps) and the once more stamped texture on the hills.

Of course I also share some of my own tutorials on my blog as I love passing on experience to others and share inspiration. I would be more than happy to welcome you on my blog "Von Pappe II" some time!

We hope you've enjoyed finding out a bit more about Claudia, thanks for joining us!

If you watch Claudia´s creation you will get endless inspriation. One Project is better than the other. It is amazing how different kind of Styles Claudia is capable of. Honestly I have never seen this by any other Artist before. Absolutely Outstanding! Claudia is so blessed with Talent and creative Ideas. And I am so happy to see that a larger Audience will be able to see this... Thank you to Craft Stamper Well Done and count me in as a new Subscriber for this Magazin!

Wow wow wow, all is wow from you Claudia, as far I'm concerned I already LOVE your very first prohject with stamps!!!! And you second one is just... well, just speechless. Maybe it's your great versatility that is also so interesting and gripping.. and your taste for creating fabulous things always, often stunning and with great details. Speaking for me of course. So even if I don't have enough time to follow on their blogs all the artists I love now, discovering them one after the other since the beginning of my art journey, you are becoming surely one of them claudia, I'm fond of your works, always different and unique :) xx